I made a 3 part Blog post about STR and VIT (as well as other stats)

You can read it here. But I'll post it here because it is relevant.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...26/blog/263765

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There is a controversy about WAR stats that really shouldn't exist. Should a Warrior Tank Stack VIT? Or STR? What about DEX? Well, hopefully I can clear the air and help people stat their WAR a bit better.

On the side of VIT are folks who want to get as much HP as possible. They say that a WAR can't survive unless he has a huge pool of HP. They don't view self-healing as something as important as being able to take the biggest hits in the game. They cite as references the damage that they can take in Coil. They are the vast majority of WARs. "Damage dealt as a tank is not nearly as important as the damage taken as a tank." is their motto.

In the other corner are the STR stacked WAR. They hail that their self-cures are great! They mitigate damage by killing the mob faster that they can survive and not be a drag on the mages. They say that even with stacking STR, they don't suffer that much in HP loss. Their enmity is unbreakable and their attacks unyielding. "Kill it before it kills you! With self heals, you have as much HP as the mob you're fighting!" Is their motto.

So who's right?

The truth is they both are.

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Vitality -- HP in numbers
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To start with, let's look at Vitality stacking, the most common stat allocation of WAR tanks. It's easy to see why it's so popular. With enough HP, you don't have to worry that much about Self-heals. The WHMs will be able to fill your HP so long as you mitigate in other ways, like having a good Parry-rate and dodging. On Titan, they are happy they can actually survive the multi-hits before during and after Mountain Buster with plenty of HP to spare. It's hard to see any downside to this. The worst tank ever is a dead tank.

But that doesn't mean there aren't any downsides. WARs that are VIT stacked contribute barely more Damage dealt than a PLD with similar stats. Worse, they aren't actually mitigating any damage with the self-heals, which are a paltry amount even if they tried. They are little more than meat shields...and poor meatshields at that. They rely only on Thrill of Battle to increase their HP pool and Infuriate to boost the heals received from mages. All other self heals are less and not really worth using at all.

This puts pressure on the mages to continually fill a growing HP pool that's getting big bites taken out of it with no mitigation at all. It's easy to see the disadvantages to this and why so many people prefer PLD over a VIT-stacked WAR. Stacking Vitality is a pre-emptive way to taking more damage, but in the end it mitigates almost no damage taken.

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Strength -- HP in skill
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Strength stacked WARs take a different approach. Instead of pouring all their stats into the HP pool, they go for the amount of damage dealt and boosted mitigation. Their HP is less so they may dive deep in the the red more often, but their also more easily filled by the mages since they have the same benefits from Wrath V, as well as a sturdy self-heal ability. A Strong WAR will be able hit for more, Crit for more, Parry for more and hold more enmity more quickly as well as kill the mob faster.

But there's an obvious downside as Vitality-stacked WARs (and PLD who are against WAR) will be quick to point out. For STR-stacked WAR, survival is more tenuous. If you have put the majority of your points into STR, you won't break far over 7k even with Thrill of Battle. There's no way you can deal with the hits of Coil and even Titan will sometimes one shot you.

So which to choose?


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Why not both? The Balance of Damage Taken and Damage dealt
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It's clear that both these stats contribute to a WARs survival. That's why I advocate Stacking both STR and VIT as equals. Imagine a set of scales. On one side is damage taken and the other side is damage dealt. You want to max your HP as well as your mitigation. You want to max your damage dealt as well as your survivability. One should not outweigh the other and throw things out of balance. So if you stack Vitality in your allocations, wear jewels that will stack Strength to balance it out. Or make your allocations both STR and VIT... but don't go too far in one direction.

But you can only take this so far. Vitality and Strength are main stats, meaning that if you HQ gear, then they are pre-capped and you can't add any more. In addition, while food can increase VIT there's no food for STR. So you must take other approaches to keep things in balance.

Once you have your VIT and your STR as high as it can be for your item's level, start adding secondary stats for damage dealt and taken. Parry will increase the amount of times you Parry. This syncs with the Strength you have added that increases the amount of damage your parry mitigates. You'll see a nice increase in the amount of damage you can take. Of course, if STR was not your priority you won't see much by the way of damage mitigation from Parry. So you can see the advantage of taking a balanced approach with VIT and STR. If you are currently working stuffing as much VIT as possible onto your gear, you only stand to benefit to adding some STR.

If you add Critical Hit Rate buffs to your stats, you will also see that you will be able to mitigate quite a bit more as well. The Critical Hit Rate on WAR is higher than other classes thanks to Wrath V buff to critical hit rate. The more you crit the more damage you deal and the more you can heal yourself for. This adds to your mitigation but not necessarily to your survivability. If you are a STR stacked WAR, you will only stand to benefit from adding some Vitality before heading to Crit Rate.

What about Skill speed and Dexterity? What about Determination? You can sprinkle these in if you would like, however, all three of these stats are like the dessert at the end of the meal. They all will add something, but not very much. So pick whichever one you like or feel free to skip them completely.

Now that you've added these stats to your gear, add others for situational problems. For example, you need more accuracy for Coil, 470 at the bare minimum (I recommend 475 really). Many Accuracy jewels are quite balanced between STR VIT and Parry so you don't lose much when you switch out accessories to increase your accuracy. Food also can increase accuracy quite a bit but can be expensive if you don't make it yourself.

Hopefully, this gives you some ideas about what you should gear and allocate your WAR and what stats you should be focussing on.

As a summary:

Strength and Vitality in equal or near equal measure.
Parry and Critical Hit Rate next
Accuracy, Skill Speed, Dexterity and Determination last.